GRANVILLE, Ohio (January 25, 2023) – Darren Rubin scored a new career-high of 45 points, with 34 of those points coming in the second half as the Denison University men's basketball team posted a 91-79 win at home over Oberlin College on Wednesday night in North Coast Athletic Conference action. It was the most points by a single player in a game for the Big Red in over 115 years, a mark not eclipsed since the namesake of Livingston Gymnasium, Walter Livingston, who scored 47 points in 1905-06 and had 56 points in 1906-07.

Oberlin started 7-for-11 from the field and 3-for-4 from three in the first five minutes of the game to take a 17-11 lead before 3-pointers by Scotty Dean and Nick Heath tied it up at 17-17 six and a half minutes in.

Another 3-pointer for Oberlin then made it a 22-17 Yeomen advantage just over seven and a half minutes in, and then after a layup by Will Hunter eight minutes in, the two teams went scoreless for the next four minutes until the fifth 3-pointer of the opening 20 minutes for Oberlin made it 25-19 Yeomen.

In all, Oberlin led by six points four times in the first half, with the final occurrence coming at 27-21 with six and a half minutes left in the first half.

Denison took its first lead of the game at 32-31 after a pair of free throws by Heath with 3:44 left in the first half. That was then followed up by a 3-pointer by Chase Ouellette, two free throws by Rubin, a powerful dunk by Ricky Radtke and a fastbreak layup by Dean to make it 41-31 and cap a 17-1 Big Red run with just under two minutes left before halftime.

Rubin added a jumper in the final 15 seconds of the first half to make it 43-34 Big Red at the break, and he then hit two 3-pointers and scored eight points during a 14-0 start to the second half for the Big Red to expand their lead to 57-34 three and a half minutes into the period.

That put Rubin at 19 points on the night, and he was not done as he added an and-one under a minute later to surpass his previous season-high of 21 points and make it a 24-point game at 60-36.

Rubin would continue to cook throughout the game, adding three more 3-pointers and an and-one while ultimately setting a new career-high with 45 points and finishing 15-for-24 overall, 6-for-10 from three and 9-for-10 from the free throw line.

In the end, Rubin now ranks third for most points in a single game in Denison history, surpassing the 44 points scored by Lou Mitchell, the person the Mitchell Center is named after, also against Oberlin in 1954-55.

Also scoring in double figures for the Big Red was Radtke, who finished with 16 points on 7-for-10 shooting and added a team-high seven rebounds. Heath and Dean were both next with seven points while Hunter added a game-high five assists.

With the win, the Big Red improved to 9-8 overall and 5-4 in the NCAC while Oberlin, which was coming off an 86-82 overtime loss against Wabash on Saturday, dropped to 5-14 and 1-9.

Denison will finish off the week at Wittenberg University at 3 p.m. on Saturday, January 28, before playing at home during each of the next three Wednesday nights.